gence of age and youth, the mutual influence of enthusiasm and experience upon one another, is by far the best preventive of moral evil; and, when moral evil is prevented, moral good springs up spontaneously. (See Genesis xviii. 17, 18, 19; and Malachi, iv. 5, 6.)

P. 304, bottom of the page." Now this, I say, is unnatural." The cause is explained by Rousseau: "La Philosophie ne voyage point." The philosopher perversely puts his mind into a go-curt, in order to keep the profane vulgar at a distance; and denies himself the pleasure of pedestrian activity, till he loses the relish for it. 66 Ego sane in ea opinione jam diu sum, neque egregiam sententiam inquam fuisse quæ placuit populo, neque sapientiam vulgari majorem vulgo agnosci posse." Hobbes, De Cive, Praefatio.

P. 307.-The piety of the Jews was public spirit, and was not essentially different from the patriotism of the early Romans. See Psalm cxxii.

P. 308, note.-The sentiment of David in 2 Samuel, xxiv. 17, breathes the very spirit of Henry the Fourth. The character of this king is the very opposite of what is vulgarly called a saint. They differ like the characters of Charles and Joseph Surface in the "School for Scandal." The character of David is equally distinguished from that of the cold political moralist, who mistakes his love of sway, or his dread of violence, for the love of virtue, and overlooks all the generous qualities of the poor, in his zeal to suppress their vices. Contrast David with Eliab, in 1 Samuel xvii. 28, 29.

P. 309, note." It is very much by the exhibition," &c. It is only by the exhibition of human nature that we discover the truth of the history, or the divine original of the religion. We have no knowledge of any nature but our own; and without knowledge, we have no foundation for argument.

What is it wherein ye were inferior to other churches, except it be that I myself was not burdensome to you? Forgive me this wrong." 2 Cor. xii. 13.

P. 311.-It is evident that the spirit of persecution is not only different from the spirit of Christianity, but directly opposite to it. It is a part of that character to which our Saviour

discovers on every occasion a particular aversion, I had almost said, a constitutional antipathy. It belongs to the spirit of the Scribes and Pharisees, which he declares to be worse than the spirit of publicans and harlots. There is as much difference, and as much antipathy, between the Christian and the Pharisaical character, as between the instincts of the dog and the cat. Whoever loves the one, will necessarily hate the other, with all his mind, and soul, and heart, and strength."

-P. 312.-There is an existing aversion to infidelity, which may be promoted in the same indirect way in which Hume and Gibbon promoted the aversion to Christianity, which prevailed in that age. "The lord commended the unjust steward, because he acted wisely; for the children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light."

P. 316, note.-The idea is not clearly expressed. Philotheus will understand it, but many of his readers will not. The passage alluded to is an instance of the condescension by which the operations of the Deity are accom-' modated to the infirmities of human beings; from the particular instance a general principle may be deduced; and by the aid of this principle we may obviate the objection of Cleanthes. The religion that came down from heaven was designed to operate upon imperfect beings, and was, therefore, accommodated to their imperfect understandings. It was necessary to permit certain natural errors to mingle with the divine truths that were revealed, and to sacrifice philosophical accuracy to practical effect.

By reasoning from such parts of a man's conduct as we understand, we may obtain a general knowledge of his character, which will assist us in explaining the difficulties that occur in other parts of his conduct. In like manner, by reasoning from such passages of Scripture as we appear to understand, we may obtain general principles; and, by reasoning downwards from these principles, we may explain some of the difficulties that occur in other passages. The more principles we discover, the more will our difficulties be diminished; and the gradual disappearance of these difficulties will be the best proof of the truth of our principles. Is it not evident,

that in this way we shall in due time get rid of predestination, arbitrary election, irresistible influences, and every other such like "monstrum horrendum, informe, ingens, cui lumen ademptum"-those idola specus of theology which must inevitably vanish before the day-light of genuine moral criticism? The true system of Christianity will thus be recovered, by applying to the fragments of our Saviour's life and instructions that have been preserved in the four gospels, the same method of reasoning by which Dr Simson and Dr Matthew Stewart have restored the geometrical analysis of the ancients. I think it is clear, from the difficulties that occur in the New Testament, and from the comparison of one gospel with another, that the discourses of our Saviour have been not only imperfectly, but even somewhat inaccurately, recorded by the historians of his life, and that it is not by grammatical or philological reasoning on the text of Scripture that Christianity, in its perfect form, will ever be recovered. Philology must be aided by philosophy, and philosophy by imagination, and imagination by moral sentiment and piety." The letter killeth: it is the spirit that giveth life." It appears to me that this view of the subjeet would become much more general if religious people were more in the habit of taking their opinions directly from the Scriptures, particularly the four gospels, instead of consulting commentaries and theological treatises. There is precisely the same spirit of dogmatism on the one hand, and of servility on the other, in the religion of this age, as there was in the natural philosophy of the predecessors of Lord Bacon; and it is high time that we should "awake out of our sleep," and transfer the independent spirit of Bacon's philosophy to an inquiry infinitely more important, and even more fruitful. The best method of investigation is, I think, the following:

Instead of our exhausting our minds in dry philological disquisition, let us at once set our imaginations afloat in search of hypotheses, by which we

There is no danger of error in contriving hypotheses. The more hypotheses we have the better; they will destroy one

VOL. VIII.

may reconcile the apparent disorders of the world with the attributes of the Deity, and let us endeavour to interpret the obscurities of the New Testament by the aid of these hypotheses. If they receive no illustration whatever, we know that our hypothesis must be wrong, and we must endeavour to invent a better one. If a partial and imperfect illumination is produced, our hypothesis is probable, and ought to be used as a guide till we have discovered a better. And if we could discover a hypothesis, by which the difficulties could be made to disappear altogether, I think we should not hesitate to adopt that hypothesis as an article of faith. We have no other evidence of the Newtonian system but the full explanation which it affords of the phenomena.

I think that the difficulties which occur in the New Testament may be greatly diminished by adopting the hypothesis of an Universal Restoration, and by considering the present and future misery of the sinner rather as the instrument of sanctification than as the punishment of sin; and that the light and beauty which this hypothesis throws over the whole of the New Testament is an evidence in its favour, additional to that which appears to be furnished by the verbal import of particular passages. I also think that there is an internal evidence in favour of this doctrine which resembles the internal evidence in favour of Christianity, and I can never read Mr Erskine's able work on this last subject without making an application of his reasonings which does not seem to have come within the contemplation of the writer. I am willing to admit, however, that considerable difficulties remain, and that the arguments against this doctrine are not destitute of force. I cannot, therefore, consider the hypothesis as absolutely certain, though it appears to me extremely probable.

another if they are false. The danger proceeds from our obstinacy in adhering to an hypothesis after it is proved to be false. And this obstinacy proceeds from the barrenness of our minds. Those who have little, and can produce little, must be tenacious of what they have. The more ideas we accumulate, and the quicker the ratio in which we increase them, the more we can afford to scatter. "There is that scat tereth, and yet increaseth."

31

PROCEEDINGS OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF EDINBURGH.

A FORMER Editor of this Journal, (the best it has had in our recollection) was in the habit of introducing into it, from time to time, little sketches of the more popular communications, which had been laid before the Royal Society of this city. We believe we should have been more successful in the exercise of our high functions, if we had kept a steadier eye, upon the plain course chalked out for us, by this unassuming and intelligent man, who is always equal to any thing he undertakes, (sometimes, works of great research and ingenuity,) and who never undertakes any thing to which he is not fully equal. It is not often, indeed, that the speculations of the learned body above mentioned contain matters very interesting to the public. Papers of science, detached from the subjects of common inquiry, may find, no doubt, a very appropriate place in the Transactions of the Society before which they are read, but are scarcely adapted for a more extensive circulation; besides, the Philosophical Journal is the proper place for detailing such of their conclusions, as are more immediately fitted, for general information and utility. But there are occasional sketches of biography and of literary criticism, in which all naturally take an interest, especially if they are given by men, whose very names carry with them the weight of authority. We delight to read the lives of illustrious characters, particularly when they are written by those who are themselves following in the course of the same virtuous and honourable ambition,—and nothing can be more enlivening and refreshing,

See the Letter from an Elder of the

Reformed Jews, in the Appendix to Mr Way's Letter on the Conversion of the Jews.

after the hasty and crude criticisms which we are all (every human being who can read, or hold a pen,) pouring out, day after day, on the no less hasty productions of contemporary genius,-to listen to the temperate and well weighed observations which have been matured by years of thought and experience, and which arise, so beautifully, in a cultivated mind, from its youthful impressions of those great masterpieces of the poetic art, which we may now affect to undervalue, but which, it is pretty plain, our age has never equalled.

In the two last sittings of the Royal Society, we had the happiness to enjoy, in full measure, both of these high literary gratifications. In the one, Dr Thomson began to read a life of the great Dr CULLEN, which, by some singular accident, has hitherto been a desideratum in biography,— and it was a very striking circumstance, that the long and eminent career of his successor, Dr Gregory, had but a few days closed, before the shade of Cullen seemed again to look down upon the scene of its mortal labours. While, in one view, there seemed here to be some culpable neglect of the reverence due to the memory of departed genius,—yet, in another view, it was delightful to feel that distinguished merit and ability can never die,-that whenever it is brought forward to our eye, though at the distance of half a century, it returns with all its native and original freshness, and if, which we trust will not be the case, the name of GREGORY itself shall be as long of gathering all its fame, yet that our children will, one day, have the lively impression of his vigour, integrity, and genius, brought full upon their minds by some kindred spirit, in almost the same deep characters on which we are now meditating amid our recent memory and tears.

This was the feeling which naturally arose from this late commemoration of the achievements of Dr Cullen, whose biographer is entitled to great praise for the accuracy with which he has investigated the obscure parts of his early history, and for that life and animation which he has thrown into the narrative. We do not mean to attempt any sketch of what has only been begun, and which will in due time be before the public in its complete form. But, in the mean while,

we may safely say, that we have not for a long time heard any real history that had more of the spirit of a fine romance, or was more rousing to the imagination, than this opening of the story of young Cullen and his great compeers. There were no less than two other distinguished men in the same profession, who started with him nearly at the same time, and from the same part of the country, Dr William Hunter, and Dr Smellie. They all three were the sons of persons in rather straitened circumstances, and the last in an inferior station, in the neighbourhood of Hamilton, but, by the independence of their minds, their great talents, and that noble quality of their country, indefatigable perseverance, they worked their way through every difficulty, till they all rose to the head of their profession Hunter and Smellie in London, and Cullen as the ornament of his native land. The correspondence between Hunter and Cullen is of the most familiar and friendly nature, and full at the same time of fire and genius. There are some letters of Dr Hunter, soon after his being settled in London, to Cullen, then practising and lecturing in Glasgow, which breathe the finest spirit of medical philosophy: and the raptures which he expresses, when his eye is catching a glimpse of any of the grand arcana of nature, almost rise to the heights of devotion. Dr Cullen was originally the preceptor of Hunter; he had afterwards a still more celebrated pupil, Dr Black, who likewise became one of his most attached friends. We are sure we have said nothing of this memoir, which will not be fully justified by its perusal.

The other regale to which we al luded was in the last sitting of the Society, (April 30,) provided for us by the Patriarch of Scottish literature, HENRY MACKENZIE. This fine veteran, who still survives the only connecting link, with the Cullens, the Kameses, the Huines, the Robertsons, and the Blairs of a former age, came forward on this occasion in all the vigour of his youthful genius, mellowed only by the mildness and the pathos of age, and ran over, in a critique of much refinement and sensibility, the works of those great poets who had originally fired his own elegant mind, and compared their excel- . lence in a strain of a very natural

and just partiality, but, at the same time, with a very light and delicate touch, with that of the style of poetry most in vogue at present. It was delightful to see the eye of Mackenzie kindling at the names of Dryden, Pope, and Parnell, whose study had been the inspiration of his youth, and beaming with the assurance of an expiring prophet, while in tracing with the nicest discrimination the different shades of their genius, he placed them each on a pedestal, before which later Poets must yet learn to bow. He dwelt long on the excellence of Pope, and vindicated the originality and the inventive power of that great poet. Invention is not only to be found, he showed, in creations of the imagination, (although nothing is finer in its way as to mere imagination than the Rape of the Lock,) but likewise in the most suitable illustrations and ornaments, whatever may be the subject of the poet's verse. Thus, in ethical poetry, there may be great invention of appropriate character, of striking imagery, of animated and expressive language, and all this is to be found in its utmost perfection in Pope. Parnell seems to be a great favourite with Mr Mackenzie, as a poet of perfect taste, and much simplicity and pathos. The most per

fect of his compositions is, in his opinion, the Fairy Tale. Mr Mackenzie, in his love of the olden time, did not even pass over Blackmore. The Creation, he said, would well repay an attentive perusal, and, were it not for the unfortunate meanness and ludicrous circumstances into which Blackmore is ever apt to fall, and which afforded so ready a handle for the rival wits to run him down, there is much in his poetry to stand the severest

test.

Amidst his admiration of the old poets, Mr Mackenzie showed himself fully sensible of their occasional failures. He pointed out some conceits which spoiled, as he conceived, some of the most pathetic passages in Pope or Gray. Pope's Heloisa not having "yet forgot herself to stone,"-Gray's "still in our ashes live their wonted fires,"- -are "concetti" unworthy of the noble poems in which they are to be found. Indeed, Gray very ingenuously confessed that he did not himself understand what he meant by that line. Mr Mackenzie, we were glad to find, did not omit an old favourite